Re: What's the relation****p between scales and chords?

On Feb 28, 12:41 pm, "Steve Latham" <llat...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> "Joey Goldstein" <nos...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in message
>
> news:fq51it$757$1@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
> > Meanwhile, did someone up-thread say that Piston used upper case RN?
> > Did he write out chord quality too? Or was the student expected to
> > interpret "II" as being a minor chord based on the active key?
>
> Schoenberg used non-case sensitive numerals. One is expected to know the
> quality in the key. Alterations (like minor iv in Major) have to be
> appended.


Thanks for the sup****t Steve.
Yes Schoenberg would probably have used the UC/RN similar to Piston. I
would think that this would have been the norm when he was still
stretching the limits of functional chromaticism and without looking
up the time line, Schoenberg may have gotten that from Piston or they
both may have gotten it from the same source.

>
> I think Piston may have started out that way, but in the more recent
DeVoto
> editions, case sensitivity is there (IIRC, I'm not positive).

Correct again. As I stated previously,  I don't know if he changed,
but  I did mention that there were many translations of his Harmony
into UC/LC notation. I really have not seen the DeVoto editions, but I
do seem to remember something similar to what you have said as this
came up in older discussions.

>
> In addition to that, there are also a couple of different schools of
> inversional notation.
>
> The "main" school is the one we're familiar with  - 6, 6/4 - etc.
>
> But there's another school that uses more "real" figures because it uses
non
> case sensitive RN. So V4/2 in Major is V4/2, but in minor, it will be V
> 4+/2 - that is, the leading tone, which will be a 4th above the bass,
would
> need to be raised. I think you can see why it's been laregely abandoned!

It should not have had to be abandoned! It never should have made it
out of the think tank. Sounds like a government committee to me.

>
> Nowadays, young Brits are learning a system forced upon them by the
ABRSM as
> far as I can tell. V, Vb, Vc, Vd - "d" is third inversion, so what we'd
call
> 4/2. Looks like they're suffering from the same dumbing-down that we (or
we,
> not you :-) Americans are.

No, every American is affected by the dumbing down in at least a small
way and probably we are the reasons for even the British to be trying
to catch up in the dumbing down department. North America in its
totality, US and Canada are both being affected by this type of
thought. If you have contacts in the regular education world of the
K-12 level you will know what I mean by merely referencing the
national program of Every Child Left Behind.  (no cutesy smile, it
isn't funny anymore)

this particular example may be the most stupid one that I have seen so
far. I only hope (although you do usually check out most of your
sources) that you are misunderstanding this system. As presented, this
sounds like another Bush educational boondoggle similar to the
atrocities that are being forced on the American education system in
the language arts in the lower grades. I don't know about all of
Canada, but our frozen neighbors to the North have some good ideas
still circulating and some dangerous directions being taken as well.
The US may be the leaders of dumbing down, but most of the rest of the
world seems to be taking the same direction. China may be on a
different track. Only time will tell, but the more I understand what
is happening there, the more curious I am as to how their traditional
rote learning is evolving into a potentially very effective form of
education.


>
> But back to the RN, one thing we should mention is that all authors in
all
> styles will sometimes speak of chords or keys of scale degrees, etc. in
a
> generic manner, and they will simply say "IV", which could refer to iv
or IV
> in minor, and IV or iv in Major.
>
> Steve

Of course we do. That is the Piston influence (either directly or
indirectly) on those of us that have gone past freshmen theory. I use
it a lot when I am talking about standard formulas that are common to
both major and minor as in II V I or I IV V I.  But I try to put them
into that context and when I do use them that way, the implication is
just that, they are common to both and it is a shorthand.

If I am directing the info to a student, I will try to make sure that
I wold use both ii7 V7 I and the  ii7-5 V7 i so that the student will
understand that the principle is the same even though the colors of
the chords are different. I may not be clear about this all the time
and I certainly wouldn't mind clearing up any confusion caused by my
addressing the wrong audience with the wrong terminology. The same is
true for analysis of jazz harmony. For the most part, relation****ps
are the same and progressions follow the same basic rules. To separate
the two by using a 'special' type of notation for jazz that is really
a step backward, only can serve to put another stumbling block to the
Jazz student making use of all the productive musical information that
is available to him. The Jazz greats learned most of what they play
from traditions found in the Classical literature, to use a system
that does not include this information is to deny these roots to the
Jazz (or rock or pop) student and should not be encouraged.

LJS